Sushi Zo Dinner in LA

LA is a terrible city.

The omakase at Sushi Zo,

however,

was amazing.

Fish has not tasted this good

in a long while.

Sweet.

Beautiful.

Each piece felt like they dissolved

like the best pieces of candies from the sea.

These fish didn't die in vain.

I can't believe I ate this much.

About three quarters through the meal,

I thought I needed to give up.

But I forged ahead

with the fear of missing a really delicious-tasting fish.

We were there for about an hour and a half.

We sat at the bar near the head chef,

but we couldn't see anything.

At least we weren't as far away as the tables though.

The whole place was designated for omakase only.

Jon thinks he was sitting nearby a famous Japanese actor,

and I can't remember otherwise.

Don't get me wrong though. 

The place is not "scene-y."

It's in a mini-mall next to a Starbucks.

It's very clean and comfortable.

Most people were taking their time drinking and eating.

Also teasing the chef for the number of courses

and for the whole "no soy sauce" instruction

(since most people drown their fish in soy sauce

so that it tastes like it drowned [rather than lived] in the ocean--gross).

The sushi were well-dressed in soy sauce 

or truffle salt 

(a few pieces had this, 

and some combinations were surprising; 

I didn't know

it'd go so well with wasabi) 

or other seasoning.

And they were excellently prepared:

not too big or too small,

each bite broke the food down so it washed my mouth

with delicious flavors,

and I didn't have to chew a lot.

(I'm thinking of the one time I spent ten minutes chewing an octopus tentacle

at a different restaurant many years ago,

trying not to be a wimp about eating things I'd normally not eat--

that's love for you.

Ten minutes of chewing!)

The rice was good: 

loose (as it should be), 

small (so it's not as filling), 

and well-seasoned (sweet, and not just a vessel for mirin).

The Tamago (Egg Omelet)

was delicious too.

Sweet and eggy and light.

A great sushi chef can really screw up the meal by

having sucky tamago.

The odd thing though was that we started our meal with miso soup,

and we didn't get any hot green tea to end the meal as at other places we've been to.

It seemed unusual, but the sushi were the stars

so it all made some sense.

I'm a little worried that there isn't a place in NYC

with as good straightforward omakase sushi.

Kanoyama's omakase last year was really good,

but it was more sashimi and other stuff.

It's like apples and oranges.

We headed to the Vons

in the same mini-mall to get ice cream

for dessert.